


Treasure

by Ael_tRlailiiu



Category: Marvel Avengers Movies Universe, The Avengers (2012)
Genre: Beginnings, F/M, Romance, Sexual Content
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-10-14
Updated: 2012-12-11
Packaged: 2017-11-16 07:18:38
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 7,977
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/536912
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ael_tRlailiiu/pseuds/Ael_tRlailiiu
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Part of a bridge sequence between Iron Man 2 and Avengers, basically a whole lotta head-canon about their relationship and Pepper's view on events. Not particularly porny, I'm afraid. Tastefully explicit? I dunno.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

Something felt weird; after a few nervous moments, Pepper realized that it was quiet. She sat on the couch in Tony's living room with work left over from the office, like she had a thousand times. Her shoes were off, it was late enough for that indulgence. For the first time in weeks, her phone wasn't ringing. No alerts flashed. No catastrophe unfolded on the muted TV.

A lot of windows were still missing. The night breeze crept in with offerings: sage and jasmine and the sea. Waves broke on the cliff below the house, a rougher music to replace the fountain.

She tapped the intercom. “Is everything all right down there?” Everything other than the half-finished reconstruction work and the question of what to do with the accelerator, anyway. _Seriously, you had to knock a hole in the wall? On top of everything else?_ she had asked.

Tony had been cheerfully unrepentant as a man reprieved from slow death might be expected to be. _Hey, talk to Coulson, he wouldn't let me leave._

_You left anyway._

_So? Send SHIELD the bill anyway._

“Er, fine?” he said now.

“Tony....”

“Really, it's fine. Just thinking they might hurry up a bit.”

She confined herself to, “We don't have any lawyers to spare right now. You tick off the electricians' union, you are on your own.”

“Noted.”

Pepper shook her head and went back to work. It would be easy even now to pretend that nothing had changed, or at least not changed any _more_.

There had been entire weeks after That Night, seven months ago now, when she didn't remember going home. She took non-stop phone calls, reviewed press releases, calmed down shaken employees, pretended to mourn Obadiah (and got a small, vicious kick out of the fact that his death was decidedly Page 2 news after the Iron Man press conference). She didn't have time to have a nervous breakdown. Her houseplants died. Her friends left increasingly acerbic voicemails demanding to know whether she was alive. Her manicurist stopped speaking to her.

For most of that time Tony was elsewhere, incommunicado. It wasn't quite as bad as those weeks he had been missing; she could work with the news on, wait to see what blew up, where, and whether he was coming back. When he was around, he was just as busy as she was, coping with the press and making repairs. She had woken from more than one unplanned nap on the couch and gone downstairs to find him asleep at his workbench, surrounded by cold cups of coffee and anxious robots.

None of that tonight. He trotted up the stairs wearing a thoughtful look along with his jeans and black t-shirt.

“Good news,” Pepper said. “We're not on the news. Again. That makes four days. We ought to have a bit of a grace period now.” With luck, that would last until Hammer's trial got underway, while the media cycle shambled off in search of fresher blood. “How's the work coming down there?”

“DUM-E could do a faster job.”

“Put up with them, or put up with having the housing inspector for the state of California as a nemesis.” She glanced at her laptop. “Speaking of bureaucracy, Agent Coulson says you missed another appointment today.”

“Where does the time go.” He dropped down onto the couch next to her with an angelic smile that would not have fooled anyone.

“He's just trying to do his job.” Pepper found the debriefing process helpful, though she still woke up shaking more often than she would like. Sometimes she dreamed about the gun turning toward her, but more often it was only Stane's warm, too-friendly smile that sent her lurching into terrified wakefulness. The smell of cigar smoke could still turn her stomach.

“I don't recall asking him to do anything.”

She wasn't ready to ask Tony what he dreamed about. “I just think you should—”

“Pepper.” He put a little drawl on the second syllable. “Not your department any more.”

“Right.” They had talked twice about her planned resignation, but hadn't gotten around to the paperwork. Tony was being intermittently helpful, and Pepper found herself getting used to the job now that no one was shooting at her.* She wrote Phil back, _Sorry, can't help you with this one._ “Well, there's still that thing at ten tomorrow. I would appreciate you showing up.”

“If you think it will help.”

“It might.” The Expo-related emergencies behind them, the investors were still skittish, the employees never sure what was going on. “Time to think long-term again. They could use a sign of,” she decided against _stability_ and said, “continuity” instead.

He made a noncommittal sound. She glanced over from her schedule to see Tony paging through a document on his tablet. He paused on a screen full of diagrams and equations, thickly annotated. She recognized the handwriting with surprise as Howard's.

“Everything okay?” she asked. A little paranoia on that score ought to be forgivable. She was not over the shock, that everything Tony had done that awful night had been deliberate—that he had made her furious, fought with Rhodey, scared the hell out of a lot of people, and been prepared to die alone, either because he thought it was necessary or because he thought it was right. She hoped it was the former, and even then, what did you even do with a man like that?

Love him, apparently, and make your own steel.

Tony shrugged and said, “Wondering how many skeletons we don't know about. How many more Vankos there are, what else SHIELD has in the basement.” He flipped a few pages and made a note of his own. A moment later he shifted closer to her. Reassuring gestures did not come naturally to him, but he was trying.

“It bears thinking about.” They had been lucky at the Expo; property damage, injuries... it could have been worse—was sure to be worse, one of these days. She had signed on for this life with open eyes. “But whatever there is, it can wait for a few hours. Or even more. Sufficient unto the day is the evil thereof.”

He gave her a sidelong _did I actually just hear that_ look, and Pepper's smile widened. She was surprised by how much she liked surprising him, by how many small adjustments there were to make. This thing between them might not work, but she wanted to try.

Pepper said, “Nothing is exploding or on fire. For once. And you are actually inventing work to do?” She took the tablet out of his hand and set it aside, left her fingers curled around his. “You weren't this cautious on the roof. Any roof, ever.” He had been a bit... not stand-offish, she had intercepted more than one glance that spoke to the contrary, but he was clearly letting her set the pace. Maybe it was just all those years of walking the line that made it difficult to step off deliberately. Or maybe he was trying to prove something. Pepper would bet on _Tony with something to prove_ against any force on Earth, but in that case he could damn well consider it proven.

“We could go outside and test the idea,” he said.

“It's not that warm out.”

“Point.” He considered her for a moment. She read a touch of uncertainty behind those ridiculous lashes of his. “In fact, we should probably just give you all of the points, right now. Have I ever actually won an argument with you?”

“There was that one time.” And if you had told her a year before that she would be challenged on moral grounds by Tony Stark of all people, she would have had concerns for your sanity.

If you had told her that he would be _right_ , she would have had concerns for her own.

“I won't let it go to my head.” The uncertainty flickered out.

 _Yes, you will._ She leaned forward. No hesitating this time. They kissed like crystal grows, unhurried and thorough. He took out her hairpins, disassembled _her_ armor with deft hands, trailed curious fingers down the back of her neck. She broke off their kiss to nuzzle her way along the edge of his jaw, then down toward his collarbone. Seemed that neither of them planned on setting a speed record; why start now?

If it had taken months for Pepper to figure out that once Tony had her in his sights, he hadn't changed his mind—in her defense, it had been easy to overlook. He had taken her rebuff well, had never raised the subject again, and there had been women around once the first dust settled. Fewer than there used to be, but Pepper wasn't vain enough to think that was down to her; it was just that everything was different.

The women were different. Before, they had been people who knew how to behave, by Pepper's lights; not professionals, but everyone involved had known what they were getting and usually went away satisfied with the transaction. Now there was security to worry about, were a lot more psychos in the crowd, and even the sane ones wanted things that Tony couldn't give them if he wanted to.

Tony was different, in ways Pepper was still trying to figure out. There was the arc reactor, obviously, which as he had said (to _Time_ magazine no less) _tends to freak people right the fuck out_. Another change Pepper saw because she was often beside him when people got too close without warning: not a flinch but the stillness that prevented one. Those days, she thought about killing Stane and wished that she could do it again. Slower.

She was a bit different now, too. _It's a good thing to know about yourself,_ had been Phil's only comment.

So it had taken her a long time to clue in to the fact that whatever feminine distractions might be around were exactly that, and there were fewer and fewer of them. When the penny finally dropped, they had both been wobbly with exhaustion somewhere over Europe. It was just a glance and a fragment of a smile, covered when he realized she was looking. He had a thousand smiles. Some of them were weapons, and most of them were masks, but this one was for her, like she was the world's first sunrise. Coming from someone who had difficulty committing to a dinner reservation, it was disconcerting.

It was still disconcerting, though not unpleasant. He unzipped her black linen dress. A fluttery pit of anticipation and want settled in below her stomach. It wasn't as if she had never considered what this might be like; Tony could be obnoxiously attractive, particularly when he wasn't going to any effort. Pepper had always kept the _obnoxious_ part well in mind. Even now, she thought he was something like phosphorous; unstable, dangerous, blinding. Pepper didn't care. She slipped her hands under his t-shirt, warmed herself on his skin.

“You can leave that if you'd rather.” His breath was light and steady in her ear.

“No.” She drew his shirt off with more care than its faded state demanded. That hard white light was a part of him now. She did not want to fetishize it, would not allow herself to fear it, could not possibly ignore it. She rested her fingers on it, let the light leak through and sensed his tension, perhaps wondering what she was thinking.

 _Let it be a light to you in dark places._ Not appropriate to the moment. Pepper moved on, traced the sturdy curve of his shoulders, found other places where the year's hard lessons were written on his body—little scars she had never noticed before, the angles where he had lost weight. She shimmied out of her dress without giving herself any more time to think about it, and in the same spirit swung herself over to sit astride him, encouraged by his hand on her hip. No sense in being coy.

Tony exhaled. “You are not an easy woman to figure out, you know.”

“You've had plenty of time.” She brushed her fingers down his stomach to the waistband of his jeans, felt his muscles twitch in answer, pressing into her touch.

“Slow learner, I guess.” That wry quirk of his lips applied it to more than just her, so she kissed him instead of snorting while her bra joined the dress in a puddle of black fabric. He moved his lips down her throat to her breast. She fought her own breath for a moment and let it go ragged as it wanted to. Her hands mapped the planes of his back and tangled his hair.

Tony stood up, without any particular effort, held her steady through her startled yip. She knew he was strong—had had it explained enough times that the armor was an amplifier, that for one you had to know where and how to hit things in the first place, and for two it didn't stop you getting _tired_ —but hadn't ever thought of how that might intersect with her body. He set Pepper down on the couch and knelt in front of her, slid his hands up her thighs until they rested on her hips, thumbs toying with the elastic of her underwear, where they ought to raise blisters for the heat she could feel.

“One of us seems to be more dressed than the other,” she said, mock-solemn to his grin.

“Much less interesting process. Also, tends to be faster. See?” Tony shucked his jeans and briefs in a compellingly smooth motion. “Where was I?” He went to work on her stockings.

“You could wear more clothes,” she said in the interests of making sure she was still breathing. Not that it was the first time she had seen him naked by a long stretch, but there was naked (or naked in bed with someone else), and there was naked and wanting _her_ , and her also being naked, or nearly so. “It would be fair.”

“I'll put on a suit tomorrow.”

“I'll enjoy taking it off.” She thought she would, too, caught his thoughtful glance at the implicit promise before he tugged meaningfully on that final scrap of fabric.

“Would be a better use for the boardroom table than it's ever seen before.” Finished with his task, he kissed her knees, then nudged them apart and started a zig-zag upward path.

“That table is glass.”

“They make airplane windows out of it, it'll be fine.” Kiss. “You weigh nothing anyway.” Kiss. “Alternative: the chairs are comfy.” Kiss. “Do we have a credenza in there?”

“You are....” Pepper jumped, and he paused, still tracing lazy circles over her hipbones, just his lips pressed against her until she relaxed. All the breath went out of her at once at the touch of his tongue. Exploring, not so light as to tease. He slid one hand around to the small of her back and pulled her closer, used his other to open her gently. The sound she made was not at all dignified. She let her spine melt down against the curve of the couch.

 _Bloody hell, he is_ good _at this._ Methodical, attentive, tuned to her the way no one else ever had been, not right away. Which made her wonder just how much attention he had been paying to her, over the years, how much thought he had given this moment and for how long, and that made her quiver deep inside, right on the edge already, and it was too soon for that.

“Slow.” For a moment she thought that he hadn't heard her, but he backed off with a questioning look. “Slow down just bit.”

“If you insist. Let's go upstairs?”

“Good idea.” Pepper's thrumming tension eased a bit on the way—just a little, enough that when they half-fell onto the bed she was laughing. That lasted until she let him pull her over with him, half on top of him, and decided that waiting even one more minute was not going to happen. She sat astride him and felt a sharp pleasure at the way he moved to meet her. “Don't.”

“I think I knew about this cruel streak? And yet.” He lay still, though, other than the play of his hands across her thighs, stomach, breasts. No room with him in it could be entirely dark.

She knew that restraint cost effort; good. He had been altogether too cool thus far—who would have thought that of the two of them, he might find it more difficult to let go of that. She sank all the way down and held there, eyes closed, head bowed while the world vanished, nothing left of it but the places where they touched. She bent down to kiss him and moved, finally, when she could no longer stand not to. They found a rhythm, and this time she let the wave tumble her over the edge, until she sank her teeth into Tony's shoulder with the force of the aftershock. It drew a yelp and then a laugh. She tightened around him, slow and deliberate.

He inhaled sharply. “Quadratic equations, not helping any more.”

“You're ridiculous,” she mumbled into his skin, then pushed herself up far enough to look him in the eye, very nearly swore aloud at the sensation.

“I've been told.” He had the wickedest grin she had ever seen.

“See if you look that smug by the time I'm done with you.” She kissed his shoulder, just where she had bitten. She wasn't normally territorial like that. Never had been before, but this was likely to be a different sort of normal. _Mine._ Beautiful and scared and shining so damn bright. Maybe it was contagious, this addiction to free-falling.

“Do tell?”

She grinned back. “I want to remember this every time I move tomorrow.” His smile melted into _that_ look, that heart-breaking intensity, before he turned them both with an ease that spoke to a lot of practice and jolted a gasp out of Pepper.

“...Challenge accepted.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The line Pepper refers to is from Fellowship of the Ring (duh), and I know I'm not the first, but I like it so it stays (though I think Tony would object violently to the comparison). The title, such as it is, comes from Conjure One's "Extraordinary Way," one of my favorite love songs. 
> 
> This is actually the first thing I started writing in this fandom. Still not sure about the results, but oh well. There's likely to be more at some point, because these two have dug their way pretty deep into my brain.


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> More of my endless head-canons, and Tony is kind of out of practice at the whole "morning after" thing.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Gratitude is due to the ever-patient IndigoStarblaster for beta reading, and to you lovely readers who are so kind to my nonsense.

Tony woke up startled by the presence of someone else in the bed. Not that he had _forgotten_ , or anything, just he wasn't used to it. He turned over and watched Pepper sleep for a moment. She had burrowed into a couple of pillows, and the sheet had tangled around her waist. Arc reactor light didn't favor her coloring at all, but the smooth perfection of her back was one of the nicer things he had woken up to.

He had been trying off and on since the Expo to locate his first memory of her. It certainly wasn't the day they met; there had been a lot of people in and out of his life back then, and he'd had no reason to remember her any more than the others. So it was a few months after that, when it sank in that she was going to stick around for a while. They had been in New York, which she liked. There had been a board meeting and a gallery opening, and she had lost her temper at him during the former and loved the latter. Since then, she had made a Pepper-shaped place in his life, and if it took an awfully long time to figure that out, well... he had never claimed to be good at _everything_.

That one day stood preserved as crystalline moments that refused to form a sequence, and every moment felt like falling. Camera flashes, Pepper's hair, silver to red-gold, her hand on his arm. Jericho missiles, her eyes closing, Rhodey's laugh, and Obadiah's smile. A succession of perfect skies flickered across his memory: dusk's edge over the pier, the cold and brilliant desert blue, the lone high glimpse of stars, the darkness washed out by LA's envious light.

Now, he had no idea what he was feeling beyond the idle need for a shower. He eased out of bed without waking Pepper up, avoided all of the familiar cold spots on the dressing room floor, and closed the connecting door. The bathroom clock said he'd been asleep around four hours. It would do. JARVIS, for once, kept his metaphorical mouth shut, which... might be a sign of approval, come to think of it; he had never hesitated to express an opinion on overnight guests before. Or maybe he was just that appalled.

While the water warmed up, Tony considered the fact that he had slept with—yes, stick to that phrasing—had slept with Pepper. This was either the best decision he had made in months or the stupidest in at least a week. That said something about the past year.

Even once the first shocking pain faded, once that first week passed, and he didn't die, he had wondered if he should. It struck mostly in the quiet hours when Yinsen was asleep, when Tony was so tired his hands shook, when work and sleep alike were impossible. With nothing but the fire's hiss, the flicker of its light on the watching cameras, and increasingly tenuous memories of home, he had wondered if this would somehow go on forever, or end without warning, if this dark, cold place would be the last thing he saw. No one would know, no one would care. Most days, whether or not he lived had been irrelevant, because in some ways he didn't really exist. There was a purpose, and the knowledge of how to carry it out, and the white light of fury driving it forward.

All of these months later, ordinary things could still seem fraught, showers included. That first night back, he had gone through every setting on the thing, including ones he had never known it had (mist? waterfall?), in something like a fugue state, wondering if this was all a last desperate dream and he would wake up and die in the sand. JARVIS had threatened to call Pepper, who had been petrified at leaving him alone to begin with. _It's okay. I'm home._ A few hard, unexpected tears, long-delayed, had struck and passed. He had ended up in the workshop, redesigning the arc reactor and wondering if he would ever dare go to sleep.

Long before that, he couldn't remember the last time he had slept (not passed out) in the same bed as another person. Waking up with someone was inevitably complicated, often weird, and occasionally alarming, and it had just sort of... happened. It was _Pepper_. If he couldn't trust her, it was time to check out; the world wasn't worth saving. He wondered if she was awake yet, and if she was looking for an escape route if so.

He avoided his own eyes in the mirror and concentrated on shaving.

She really ought to have higher standards than a serial fuck-up of his caliber.

And he should probably have thought about some of this sooner. Maybe Rhodey was right, and he just did everything ass-backward. It had worked out okay so far? It would be more work than he felt like to figure out when the last time had even been, before he gave up the whole relationship concept, decided it wasn't in the cards, or his genes, or something.

This was different than all of those other times.

At least, he wanted it to be different.

He thought that he wanted it to be different.

 _Had_ thought, through all of those hopeless weeks of trying to talk to her, that... fuck.

He'd done a lot of new things lately, right? He could do this. He pulled on some pants and went back into the bedroom.

Pepper was awake, sitting on the bed, wrapped in the sheet and looking out the windows at another perfect morning.

“Good morning,” he said, as carefully as he had ever said anything in his life.

“Morning.” She pushed hair out of her eyes with a sleepy smile that wiped every question he'd been asking himself right out of his mind. It might have been a dumb thing to rival every dumb thing he had ever done, but he didn't regret it.

Not yet when she got up and let the sheet stay where it was, a move that both floored him and turned him on so fast he actually felt dizzy. Distinctly unfair of her. Also made him wonder if it was too late to institute a “no shoes in the house” rule so she would walk like that all the time, relaxed and easy. Probably too late, but worth a try. The sound she made on being scooped off her feet was more squawk than squeak.

“What—are—”

“Avoiding awkwardness. You probably want a shower. All of your stuff is in your shower.” Her permanent claim on one of the guest rooms went back years, even if she didn't use it often. “And this is a really nice view. Are you moving in?” he asked, maneuvering her around the door with care.

“Very logical, not right now, and you can put me down.”

“I did mention the view?” Slightly flustered was always a good look on her.

“You did, yes. Door? Down.”

He set her on her feet and gave her his best querying look.

Pepper drew a breath that sounded careful. “I feel like I should just put this out there,” she said. “This _is_ going to be awkward sometimes. We just have to figure things out as we go. I haven't done this in a while, either, you know.”

“Not a fan of awkward.”

“I know.”

“Kind of a fan of you, though.”

The corners of her mouth moved, just a bit. “Give me two minutes here, okay?”

“Minutes, hours, I can wait.”

“Two minutes.” She opened the bedroom door and left it open behind her while she headed for the bathroom.

Tony was fairly sure that he hadn't been in there since Pepper claimed the space. This side of the house didn't have the ocean view; gauzy drapes hid the mountains, still shadowed at this early hour. He vaguely recognized the painting on one wall. The half-open closet door revealed components for two emergency outfits. A dish for her earrings stood on the dresser, and a couple of books on the bedside table. Nothing in it really spoke of her. He had seen her condo a couple of times, the main space all high walls and sunlight and beautiful things, a glimpse of a darker sanctum where she presumably retreated from the troubles of her world. That world was still largely in shadow to him; all of these years, she had meticulously maintained the barriers between them—not that he had pushed them much, not intentionally, because they had both been happy the way things were.

Well, no. Not actually happy, as such. Restless and bored, anesthetized and amused.

This was better. Weird and scary, but better, and Pepper was wound into everything that made it all of those things, was sharp and brave and never boring, and always so perfectly _herself_. He quite liked the thought of getting to know her better, to solve more of her puzzles. And apparently you could get to a place where hope felt... alien. The yawning pit of the past two months had eaten that a while back, and vomited up a lot of things he would just as soon not think about.

Like later this morning, and that meeting with the research heads. New directions for a company still staggering, two hours in a room with fifteen people trying not to look at him. If there was anything more awkward than surviving your own carefully-orchestrated self-destruction, he hoped he was never going to find out what it was. Really, not having to deal with the consequences had been kind of _the entire fucking point._ He knew for a fact that they all missed Obie.

Hell, sometimes _Tony_ missed the homicidal son of a bitch. Not often, but... everything had certainly been simpler then. Why was it that everyone he truly wanted to ask questions of was dead?

That said, fuck the lot of them. Stark Industries would pull through. He could come up with six profitable ideas during the drive down there, and only half of them would have to be set aside due to being ways to blow things up. Watching Pepper corral them might even be entertaining. Things were right with her, and with Rhodey—after a lot of yelling, of course, and he didn't pretend to understand _how_ , but it was the only thing he really cared about, especially when the bathroom door opened.

The past week had been a long one, of looking at her and not moving beyond the occasional kiss, but that had clearly been the right decision. She leaned on the door frame, self-possessed once more, giving him that evaluating look he had seen thousands of times, that lifted brow that said _well? what are we doing here?_

The only possible response was to join her there. He had done more than enough admiring the line of her body from afar in the past year.

Funny thing: most people looking over his... portfolio of prior interests, would have said that she wasn't his type. Of course, most people were blindingly stupid.

Was it actually possible that kissing her was going to get better _every_ time? That one needed testing. She put her hand on his chest, lightly, more exploratory than anything else.

“You're not going to hurt anything,” he said.

“Scars can be funny.”

This was true. He took her hand in his and moved it. “Sensitive just here. Otherwise okay.”

Her fingertips moved slightly, mapping those few inches. “I was just thinking—I don't know you as well as I think I do.”

“You know me better than anyone else does, just about.”

“That's not saying very much. It's not a bad thing,” she added. “Just that it surprised me a little. You know I wouldn't be doing this if I didn't trust you, right?”

“I know that.” He wasn't entirely sure _why_ , but that was another matter. “I was trying, really—” It wasn't that he hadn't wanted to explain to her, he just... hadn't been able to cope with it happening at all.

She put a finger over his lips. “We had all that out. That's not what I meant. You just seem a little jumpy.”

He shrugged. “Just... let me know what you want.” Trying for a lighter tone, “Hope Diamond, baseball team, medium-sized island....”

“Just you, Tony.”

It kind of... hurt, a little bit, in an unexpected way, and he could argue with her about why that verged on idiotic, or think about all of that wasted time... or he could kiss her again (still getting better) and remember that once Pepper made up her mind, she didn't do things by halves. She pushed gently, directing him toward the bed, which, well, frankly a little surprised at himself after last night, since he wasn't exactly fifteen anymore, but the flesh was all in favor. He stopped when he bumped into the edge of the bed. Her hands moved down his sides, pushed his pants down. He maneuvered a hand in between them, followed the curl of her pelvis. She wrapped her leg around his. The brightening light through the curtains showed a flush spreading down her body.

“Never knew about this side of you.”

“I should hope not.” Pepper grinned. “Anyway, for quite a few years I thought you were an idiot.” She kissed a path down his neck.

He chuckled. “Harsh. I'm glad you changed your mind.” He slipped a finger gently along her folds, then just a bit deeper, heard the hitch in her indrawn breath.

“Maybe I have a thing for idiots.” She leaned into him, let him balance both of them for a warm and shivery moment, tip both of them down onto the bed, which was lower than he'd thought it was, and she laughed.

Don't ever look back.

  
  


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I have to say that as much as I like these two, I found this awfully difficult to write. Tony seems to me someone who actively avoids introspection (hence the need for life lessons to be driven in by the Sledgehammer of Near-Death). Together they have so much history, humor, and funny little points of tension, that I am not sure I will ever get it right. But anyway.


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Dancing and other things on the eve of a new project.

No one but Tony Stark would ask, while still only half-out of the armor, “What's your favorite dance step?”

“Waltz,” Pepper said with only a brief hesitation.

“No, that's just the one you know how to _do_.” The armor was only scuffed, and he was ruffled and grinning, so she must assume that things had gone well. Chalk up another win for the good guys, and when had she gotten so blasé.

“Well if you know these things, why did you ask?” Since he wasn't hurt, she could be annoyed.

“Because I would like to take you dancing sometime.”

“We can't,” she started to say, thinking about publicity and press and security by reflex, and then remembered that Tony had never met a _can't_ he hadn't enjoyed crushing into powder. She crossed her arms; it was chilly down here in her t-shirt, and it still felt a little strange to wear jeans in the house. She still hadn't moved in, but it had been more than a week since she slept at her condo. “Why?”

“Because it's... fun? We didn't get to properly, that one time.”

“Sometime,” she temporized. “We're leaving for New York tomorrow, remember?”

“Of course I remember, it's your debut. I'll take you dancing in New York.” The disassemblers finished. “So we should practice now, right?”

“I have fifteen thousand things left to do.” She shouldn't be nervous. After everything she had done in the past year, a simple presentation to a receptive audience should not be eating her like this. They had been through all the preliminary rounds; one more and it was a go.

“I happen to know that you have been rehearsing the presentation in your sleep. And you've been packed for a week already.”

“So?”

Sometimes she thought that she was trying to start a fight to get it over with. Three months seemed a long time without one.

 _What are you talking about?_ had been Jim's response to that, while she wondered why she didn't seem to have any normal friends any more, that is to say people who didn't think flying around in metal suits shooting at each other was the most fun ever. _You two argue constantly._

_That's just... discussing, it's not the same thing. Normal people in normal relationships have fights once in a while._

_Oh,_ that _kind. You two ever do that, you'll kill each other. For real._

_She had, perhaps, looked skeptical. Then again, the fact that Rhodey and Tony were even speaking to each other now was due to either a legitimate miracle or Jim's verging-on-psychic ability to figure out Tony's brain, so maybe he knew what he was talking about._

_I mean it. I know you two. You ever seriously want to hurt Tony, they'll be cleaning blood off the walls for a week. Do me a favor, don't do that. I'm enjoying the drought of 2 a.m. existential crises disguised as conversations about Loony Tunes. Dump him if you want to, but don't be mean about it._

_I don't want to._

She still woke up wondering about that. The past few weeks had been the final turn of a piece that settled their long, strange pattern, finding out that they could _work_ together. That if it sometimes seemed like Tony had taken over her entire world, she could stake a claim on his, too—a spill of thoughts into words into plans into _things_ she could hold and touch. This project was _hers_ , and it would be _theirs_. It was the only way things could have worked, and she hadn't expected that it was going to, and that this whole thing might actually, well, _work out_ left her astonished and occasionally a little scared.

Tony leaned on the nearest bench and looked at her. “Would you rather I didn't go? I do realize I can be a little....”

“...Bit of a spotlight hog?”

“That wasn't was I was going to say, but sure.”

“It's just a presentation. It's fine.” She uncrossed her arms and settled her shoulders.

“Prove it. Relax for a few minutes.”

“Just because I'm not relaxed doesn't mean I'm not fine.”

He _tried_ not to laugh. She had to give him credit for that.

“Look,” she said, “what is with this sudden obsession?”

“I just got to thinking, on the way back, about that night we danced, and that you never actually got to enjoy going to those things. You were always working. You know there's going to be at least one party while we're in New York, right? It would be nice if you got to enjoy it.”

“You mean _you_ will be bored.” Three parties on the schedule so far, and Pepper had actually planned on working at those, because—oh.

“Well, I can hardly dance with anybody _else_. I'm pretty sure that's in the rule book somewhere.”

Everybody knew about them by now, but Pepper still made an effort to keep things low-key in public, because it was one thing to be _the famous Pepper Potts_ and another thing to be... this.

She could go to those events and work—could go alone, for that matter, and that would say something, take up the whole spotlight and damn the torpedoes. She had already left scars on people who didn't want to take her seriously. She thought that Tony genuinely wouldn't mind if she did that, even if he had taken to referring to himself as her consort. It wouldn't do, though. They were doing this together. Not as employer and employee (no matter what the org chart said this week), not as arm candy (tabloids notwithstanding), but as partners.

“Point,” she said, because winning one off her always made him grin.

“JARVIS, you want to give us a rumba?”

“Certainly, sir.”

“Why rumba?” She felt a reluctant smile tug at her lips.

“Come here and I'll show you.”

Pepper had her suspicions about where this was going to end up, if only because Tony could turn a budget meeting into foreplay. He usually got back from a fight in one of two states: too worn out to move and muttering uncomplimentary things about tank gunners, or over-adrenalized and in need of further tiring out. (She could always say no, in which case he would shrug and find something else to do until he hit the wall, after which he would sleep for twelve hours. This is not the vision of domesticity she grew up with, and neither one of them ever uttered the word _children_ , but tomorrow they were going to start building a skyscraper.)

She did know the correct position, though she felt a bit silly as she put her hand in his, her other on his arm, the dense black fabric firm and smooth under her fingers.

“Let me guess,” he said. “You learned waltz in high school gym class?”

“Yes, actually.”

“Since then? It goes like this, one, two, and... three.”

Ah, she could see the appeal: hips. “Prom. Friends' weddings. Girls' nights out.” She felt at least as awkward as she had on any of those occasions, trying to follow the slow beat of the music and his movements. She suspected that JARVIS was laughing at them, but then she thought that a lot.

“You went to prom?”

“I did, yes. It was... normal. I don't know. We all took ourselves very seriously. You?”

“Never had that problem.” He guided her through a turn.

“I meant the prom.”

“Nope. Had fun, though. You know you're going to do fine, right?”

“I _hope_ so. And if you ask me 'what's the worst that could happen' I will spike your next smoothie.”

“What with?”

“Wondering is part of the revenge.”

“I see.” He considered that, or her, while Pepper tried to concentrate on where her feet were. “I'd tell you to picture them naked, but I don't know who's going to be there, that might not be in my best interests.”

“What do you mean _you don't_ —” She realized halfway through the sentence that he was teasing her. “Don't. Do. That.”

“Relax. I am not going to fuck up your big day, I swear. At least, not on purpose. Close your eyes.”

“I'll bump into something.”

“No, you won't. _Trust_ me. You're anticipating, not following.”

“I don't _do_ following, and I'm trying to think.”

“Don't think. Move.”

She scowled but closed her eyes and tried to respond to the light pressure of his hand against hers instead of worrying about what he was going to do next. The music and the motion, so different from the usual run of either one down here, settled her nerves to a surprising extent. They maneuvered down the line of cars with compact steps and tight turns. Pepper let her eyes open again and saw that trace of a wistful smile, and everything about this moment was so old and so new at once that her heart jumped.

He leaned forward to murmur in her ear. “Lasted longer than I thought you would.”

Pepper smiled. “You want to play _that_ game?” Her hand moved on his arm, traced the line of his bicep. “Last I checked, I was winning.” They were neither of them always patient, but she had a bit of an edge. Usually. Maybe she ought to stop thinking about the damn meeting for a while.

“My chance to even it up, then.” He must have meant it, since he changed the line of their movement to point toward the elevator. Pepper had to be pretty well warmed up in advance to find the workshop an appealing environment—not to say that it hadn't happened, but so far it had usually involved a frustratingly long drive home and not even bothering to get out of the car once they got there, and oh God this was _home_ wasn't it, who did she think she was kidding?

She lived in a house with its own elevator, with a man who had never in his entire life had to do his own laundry but who was Iron Man when he thought it necessary, and somehow this was all right. She leaned back against the elevator wall and pulled Tony close, then went to work at that spot on his neck that was directly wired to his groin.

He held perfectly still, hands on her waist but unmoving until finally one slipped under her shirt and up, then down the curve of her hip.

“Three minutes,” she murmured with a smile.

“Three minutes, thirty-seven seconds,” he corrected with a glance at his watch. “ _No_ problem. Turn around.”

She raised an eyebrow but did so. That hand moved around to her other side as she turned, but otherwise didn't move. His other went to the back of her neck. His thumb drew tension out of her, found the knots and melted them away. She sighed a little and let her eyes close. Maybe he had changed his mind; she felt much more relaxed, but not in a turned-on way. Still, a timer was running in her mind.

At three minutes and thirty seconds, she had a moment of warning, a tickle of breath before he bit down very gently on the nape of her neck, just the lightest scrape of teeth across her warm and sensitized skin. Pepper jumped, arched against his mouth without meaning to and swore.

“Your point,” she conceded.

They stepped out of the elevator; the doors closed, leaving the hall dark around them. Feeling very warm indeed now, she slipped a hand up under his shirt and ran her fingertips around the lower edge of the reactor. The dark fabric looked damn good on him but didn't stretch much. “Off.”

“Unfair advantage?” He ran both hands under her shirt, unhooked her bra, brushed his thumbs over her nipples before pulling both articles off.

“Uh-huh.” She got a little breathless with the things his mouth was doing. “You tried that last time.”

“Unfair anyway,” he said between sucks and teasing little nips. “Given that I have been thinking about doing _this_ ,” his slid a hand down her front, under her jeans, but stopped his fingertips just shy of where she wanted him because he was a bastard, “for at least two time zones and _you_ have been thinking about Powerpoint slides.”

“Those are the breaks.”

“I seem to recall there's a serviceable bed somewhere in this building.”

“Three minutes.” She pushed him against the wall and unbuttoned his pants. “And maybe I have very interesting slides, okay?” Whatever retort he had in mind never got said. Skin so perfectly soft and smooth and hard against her hand, her mouth, that paradox of maleness that never ceased to intrigue her. She had one goal at the moment, and that was to make him say her name.

Preferably, in less than three minutes.

No problem. She drew back, leaving her lips wrapped close around just the head, her tongue describing a slow circumference.

“Don't stop?”

He was more primed than she had realized, or else she was doing a very good job—at leading or following or did it matter when they were both this impatient, when she was tempted to say _no_ just because she didn't want to wait. She could do that, though, and the points thing was silly, but she did remember it when he said her name again in warning this time. _Hot, sticky, and slightly dazed_ was as good a life as any. Pepper used her t-shirt to clean herself off a bit as she got up, but she only got the job half-done before he pulled her into a kiss that left her entirely breathless.

The hall seemed to have gained a mile in length, but they managed. She dropped onto the bed, wriggled out of her jeans and underwear, and had one sock off (it was enough to make her want to wear stockings every day, there's no way to look anything other than awkward while taking off _socks_ ) when Tony pounced on her. Pepper forgot about the other sock; his tongue pushed up inside her. She made a desperate little noise and bucked against him. He obliged with one finger, then two while he lapped at her clit, just a bit irregular out of some apparent desire to make her insane. She might have growled; he might have laughed. She might have whimpered when he stopped teasing.

It didn't happen often, but sometimes... she hit the rising wave just right and _stayed_ there. She heard something that might have been interrogative, might have been a response to her gasp, heard herself say _don't stop don't stop_ and occasionally _oh god_ and she could feel the crest approaching so slowly and every instant beforehand was as intense as anything she had ever known and _oh there now oh_ fuck. She screamed until she ran out of breath.

For a little while then the only sound was her breathing. She opened her eyes eventually to find Tony leaning on his elbow, looking at her with interest.

“I don't often regret not being a woman.”

She didn't dignify that with a response. She wanted more; she didn't want to move. She compromised by inching nearer, fit their lengths together and ran idle fingers through his hair, pressed the tips into his scalp, massaged just a little. She used to think that she had never met anyone more solid, who took up so much space in the world. It had taken a long time for her to understand that for the illusion it was, and to understand her own gravity.

“I believe this one was a tie,” she said.

“I don't believe the round is over.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is probably the last one; I wanted to make a connection in my head between the way they are together at the end of IM2 and the way they are in Avengers, to the extent of my ability. I just have this conviction that after knowing each other for so damn long, their relationship has a kind of ease to it. Also a lot of friendly competition. And a lot of sex. Thanks to IndigoStarblaster for patience and beta-reading.


End file.
